Collin Holton's walk-off home run gives West All-Stars a split

Saturday

Jun 28, 2014 at 12:01 AMJun 28, 2014 at 11:19 PM

BY Johnny CamposOF THE JOURNAL STAR

EAST PEORIA — The first home run of the season for O’Fallon’s Collin Holton came in all-star fashion on Saturday night.Holton hit a two-run, walk-off home run in the bottom of the eighth inning to give the West a 7-5 win and a split in the 40th annual Illinois Coaches Association Senior East-West All-Star Baseball Games at EastSide Centre.The East won Game 1 10-3 and appeared to get nothing short of a split after tying Game 2 with two runs in the seventh off East Peoria hurler Kevin Ulrich.The game would have ended in a tie had the West not scored in the bottom of the eighth.Jon Kramer of Beardstown started the winning rally with a one-out single to right.That ended four straight strikeouts by East reliever Nick Yung of Freeburg.Holton (2-for-2) then crushed a 3-2 pitch over the left-field fence for the game-winner.“I just got my pitch and just drove the fastball that he gave me,” Holton said. “(Yung) was big and dominant, but he just left one over the middle of the plate, and I did what I could with it.”Ian Hall of El Paso/Gridley, was the winning pitcher, coming on in the seventh to end the East rally and then striking out the side in the eighth.“And (Hall) had to talk me into letting him pitch,” West coach Charlie Sams of Galva/Williamsfield said. “He told me he could give me a couple of innings, and that he was actually pretty good.“And when we needed him, he got a couple of big outs for us (in the seventh), and did we have a better inning than that eighth on the mound?”Hall started the game in center.“I’m actually pitching in college at Heartland next year,” said Hall, who homered in the third to give the West a 4-1 lead. “I love pitching, and I always want to pitch as much as I can.”Tommy O’Hara also homered in the third for the West, and had an RBI fielder’s choice in the sixth that put the West up 5-3.The East tied it in the seventh on a wild pitch by Ulrich and an RBI single by Danny Roscetti of Riverton to set up Holton’s game-winning homer in the eighth.“We saw batting practice, and knew that each team could hit one out at any time,” East coach Drew Gericke of Freeburg said. In Game 1, the East and West teams both had six hits, but the East scored three runs on wild pitches and another on a throwing error.“All the kids hit well, and I was very impressed with the pitchers that we put out there,” Gericke said. “And we had timely hitting, scoring more than one run in three different innings”A solo homer by Blake Deatherage of O’Fallon sparked the West to an early 2-0 lead.But the East tied it with RBIs by Roscetti and Kevin Coppin of Lisle in the second.Coppin also had a two-run single in the five-run third.Starter Anthony Santos of York was the winning pitcher, striking out five in three innings.Johnny Campos can be reached at 686-3214 or at jcampos@pjstar.com. Follow him on Twitter at @johnnycampos59.